


stone my heart and firm resolve

by des-troyer (devilsalwayscry)



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Illusions, Magic, Pre-DMC3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-23
Updated: 2019-11-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:01:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21527983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilsalwayscry/pseuds/des-troyer
Summary: Vergil spins slowly, hand resting on the hilt of the Yamato at his waist, analyzing his surroundings. Swirling clouds of iridescent gas above, dirty and cracked stone below. The courtyard is small, with a wrap-around balcony that has no access outside that he can immediately see. A blue double door is barely visible over the railing. There is nothing immediately remarkable about this place, and he does not recognize it.Not a memory this time, then, he thinks, and then aloud, he says, "What do you want me to see?""A possible outcome."
Relationships: Nelo Angelo & Vergil
Comments: 1
Kudos: 19





	stone my heart and firm resolve

**Author's Note:**

> _In a dream, a great calamity_   
>  _To stone my heart and firm resolve_   
>  _And render nerves to steel_   
>  _The polestar wheeled about my head_   
>  _Until such time it grew_   
>  _A deep well of despair I found_   
>  _The day my dreams came true_
> 
> Title from the song ["Shock Me" by Baroness](https://open.spotify.com/track/77Q7xG7LhuhKUqP3LbEQnc?si=ss5iVl7fS-S2Ffw0QsLj4g).

The change happens in an instant: reality melting away, the crypt and the human who had brought him here fading from Vergil's awareness until they are nothing more than distant shapes on the edges of his vision, dissipating slowly into darkness. A voice hisses in his mind, speaking nonsense, the same snarling demonspeak as the previous guardians of the Temen-ni-gru. Weaving their magic, creating a new illusion with which to test him.

Vergil closes his eyes against the inky darkness around him, waiting. Tingling magic washes over him, prickling along his skin like static, and when it passes, he reopens his eyes to see he is standing in a dark courtyard.

He spins slowly, hand resting on the hilt of the Yamato at his waist, analyzing his surroundings. Swirling clouds of iridescent gas above, dirty and cracked stone below. The courtyard is small, with a wrap-around balcony that has no access outside that he can immediately see. A blue double door is barely visible over the railing. There is nothing immediately remarkable about this place, and he does not recognize it.

 _Not a memory this time, then_ , he thinks, and then aloud, he says, "What do you want me to see?"

_"A possible outcome."_

Vergil hums. He's growing tired of these illusions and tricks. Breaking these seals has been a trivial matter aside from the sheer frustration associated with the constant mind games these demons seem so very fond of.

 _"It would do you well to pay attention,"_ the demon says, and Vergil turns to the sound of metal on stone, a shadow cast across the courtyard before him. 

Standing atop the balcony is a knight, demonic energy pouring off his form in waves intense enough that Vergil's lips curl into a snarl on reflex. The creature wields a massive broadsword, which it holds aloft, arm stretched skyward above its head. It watches him through glowing red eyes that blink and flicker like stars as they track his movements. 

His grip tightens on the Yamato and he pauses in his pacing. "Explain."

Before the voice can speak once more, the knight leaps from the balcony, broadsword angled in a downward strike, and Vergil blinks to the side as it crashes into the marble where he once stood. A fight, then? If this particular seal requires a display of his strength, then so be it. He is more than capable of dealing with whatever illusion this demon has created for him.

He draws the Yamato and charges, quick as lightning across the courtyard. The demon parries him, broadsword blocking the blow before Vergil can make a proper move against him; quick, in that, if clumsy otherwise. Deflecting the attack allows it to follow through with a counter, and it is Vergil now who is on the defensive, boots skidding over stone as their swords clash with a clang. His arms shake from the sheer force of the swing; power rather than grace in its movements. It should give Vergil the advantage of speed, so long as he is careful.

Dashing back to put some distance between them, he summons a fan of swords and sends them flying toward his target with a flick of his wrist. The demon deflects them with his sword, then responds with a projectile of its own, a ball of blue energy that crackles with electricity as it flies through the air, singeing the tail of Vergil's coat as he dodges.

Vergil laughs. "You have some tricks of your own," he says, spinning the Yamato idly as he circles the demon from a distance. "Interesting."

They meet in the middle of the courtyard with a clash, a flurry of summoned swords and explosions of demonic energy raining destruction around them as they fight. He is evenly matched, despite the advantage his style should afford him against this foe; whatever magic created it is powerful, he will concede that much.

The thing taunts him, its voice a distorted growl, and he lands a blow on it for its trouble, a quick slash across its chest. Steel armor cracks and splinters, revealing a latticework of dark blue veins and pale flesh beneath. It is an opening wide enough he could take advantage of it and put an end to this fight, and so he focuses on it, intent on ending this charade swiftly.

He gets overconfident: he charges again, a direct attack, and the creature deflects him. Expecting another swipe of its sword in retaliation, he spins to the side--only for a steel boot to slam into his solar plexus, sending him crashing to the stone floor several feet away, gasping for air as the breath is torn from his lungs by the force of the blow. Before he can scramble to his feet it's upon him, sword raised above its head, and he has just enough time to roll out of the way before the blade is embedded into the ground where he once lay.

Damn. The thing is quicker than it had seemed at first. Vergil pushes himself up into a crouch, panting hard as he struggles to regain his breath, and flicks a cluster of summoned swords toward it as a distraction. They clang against its steel armor, breaking and shattering uselessly into glittering shards of blue, doing nothing to slow the demon's charge. Vergil swings for its wrist, slashing through the joint in the armor with the Yamato in a bid to disarm it; takes another boot to his ribs for his efforts, sending him sprawling onto his back.

The satisfying clatter of its blade hitting the ground is a short-lived victory; before he can spring to his feet it has him, a hand clasping around his ankle and dragging him across the courtyard. Vergil digs his free heel and claws into the stone, swinging the Yamato wildly at its arm in an attempt to gain the upper-hand, but it cares not for his struggles, dragging him as if he were weightless. In comparison, he may as well be--despite its overall humanoid appearance, the demon is considerably larger than him, a fact that becomes alarmingly apparent now that he is lying prone before it.

It does the unthinkable, then: it releases his ankle to instead grab the Yamato by the blade, its superior strength allowing it to rip the katana from his grasp with ease, and he _roars_ , disgusted by its display, by the fact that this _beast_ would put its hands on her. Vergil hisses as he lets his demon overtake him, the transformation exploding off of him in a wave of blue lightning as he leaps to his feet with a flap of his wings. Disarmed, he will not be able to retrieve her easily; and then he realizes that its broadsword lies at his feet, and he grabs it in a moment of feverish desperation--he _must_ get the Yamato back--

The instant his fingers close around the cold steel hilt he freezes. Something is wrong, this weapon is wrong, pulsing with a dark, twisting demonic power that feels equal parts perverse and intimately familiar, and his demon howls and snarls and bares its teeth through his mouth, because this _makes no sense_ , how could it--

It feels like _him_ , like his demon--dull and weak, strangled by whatever obscene corruption tangles with its energy, and gods, what could have possibly created this--

The demon knight returns his snarl with a cry of its own, broken and distorted by what Vergil now suspects is some form of demonic corruption (warping his voice, and it's undeniably _his voice_ , now that he knows), and before he can react it has him by the back of his neck and head. He drops the sword with a growl and grabs for the thing's wrist, but he cannot get a firm grasp on it, and it slams him against the stone wall face-first. His demon retreats with a crackle of lightning, his energy in that form spent, and the demon knight turns him around and pins him against the wall.

"Damn you," Vergil hisses, and then its hand is on his throat, crushing his larynx as it lifts him off the ground. It could snap his neck and Vergil would survive, but not even his demonic blood can withstand being suffocated; he will pass out before long, and while that, too, will not kill him, it will leave him vulnerable, a situation he cannot allow himself to be in. Frantically he kicks at the knight's thighs in an attempt to break free, but the thing's grip only tightens. Digging his fingers into the joint of its wrist gets him nowhere--there's armor on every inch of it, icy cold steel that makes his skin crawl now that he has identified the corruption that flows through it. Vergil cuts his fingers on it, slams his fist on its forearm, wrist, hand, yet it holds firm, crimson eyes focused on his face.

Disgust coils in his stomach to look at its armored mask, this twisted mimicry of himself; he bares his fangs at it even as it chokes him, kicks with all of his might even as darkness begins to encroach on the edges of his vision and his blood rushes in his ears. 

His boot collides with the front of its breastplate, snagging on the crack he'd created earlier, and he snaps his attention down to it. Without thought he summons a sword, grasping the blade and jamming it into the crevice through the armor, into the pale flesh beneath. The demon howls in pain and fury, and Vergil shoves the sword in deeper, the blade stopping against the back of the demon's armor. He summons a second one, stabbing it alongside the first, and with a scream the demon throws him.

He collides with the ground some feet away, rolling to a stop before immediately staggering to his feet. His head is pounding and his throat feels raw, a coughing fit wracking his body as he sucks air back into his lungs, but he has no time to spare for recovery. Quickly he dashes across the courtyard to retrieve the Yamato where she lies forgotten; rearmed, he charges for the knight, capitalizing on the distraction his previous attack has caused to pierce the thing's breastplate with the Yamato.

For a moment time seems to stand still, and then it grabs him again, and they collapse in a graceless tumble, the demon's hands around his neck and its weight trapping him as it falls forward. Pinned under the cold steel armor, he feels a rising panic, his pulse hammering between his temples and his breathing frantic. Its knees dig into his hips, its hands tight around his throat, the expressionless steel mask of it's helmet looming over his face. It's suffocating, in more ways than one, and he thrashes and flails as he struggles to reaffirm his grip on the hilt of his blade.

With a twist of his wrist he tears the Yamato through it's side, blood spraying from the wound and pouring hot down his sleeves and onto his chest. For a terrible moment he fears that it will not die, and it twitches atop him in some last throes of resistance before it finally falls still, the hands around his neck loosening as its life drains away.

In the silence immediately following his victory, Vergil lies on his back beneath this demonic creation, staring at the swirling clouds above, and thinks, _This is an illusion._

It is not real.

A laugh breaks out of his chest, then, so sudden it surprises him, but he finds he cannot stop--he laughs even as the demon knight's body pins him, it's blood hot and sticky and spreading in a pool around them, the lingering familiarity he feels in its touch making his demon whine and thrash in his soul; laughs even as his throat and chest burn, his head swimming from lack of oxygen. Vergil pushes his hand back through his hair, smearing blood on his face, and he laughs, because this isn't real. None of this has been real.

There is no corruption, no doppelganger, no perversion of his power.

It is simply an illusion, a trick of the demon contained in the seal, created to test him.

Vergil closes his eyes and when he reopens them he is staring at the unblinking stone facade of the third seal that protects the Temen-ni-gru. At his side stands Arkham, the human looking at him with an arched brow and a word on his lips that he does not give a voice upon seeing some expression which must pass Vergil's face. Vergil ignores him.

"In Sparda's stead," Vergil says, his voice hoarse and weak, as if his throat has been damaged, "I hearby grant you a name." In a fluid motion he unsheathes the Yamato, slicing through the bindings that comprise the seal, cutting away with ease the work his father laid before him. "Choose."

A low hum; a sound like a laugh. _"As you wish. Then, my name is Wrath."_

Vergil turns on his heel and leaves before the demon can speak again.

He has had enough of these mind-games and illusions. They strive only to distract him, to plant the seed of doubt in his soul; yet he knows that this is his best option, the only option which will grant him the strength that he needs to pursue his goals. This will not stop him.

With only one more confirmed seal remaining, he steels his resolve and presses onward.

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by the DMC3 manga, which is worth reading if only for how pretty Vergil is in it and how delightful their demon forms are. Everything else about the manga is borderline incomprehensible, but I really loved the idea of the Temen-ni-gru seals, so I ran with that for this fic.
> 
> I would've liked to use Pride for this, but alas, the manga beat me to that one. Wrath seemed like a fitting enough choice for this, too, though.
> 
> You can find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/desalwayscries), where I post a lot of DMC hollering and Vergil love.


End file.
